Review of Aarrow Ecoburn Plus 9 multifuel stove
poor grate design
If you are requiring a true multifuel stove my advice is not to buy any Aarrow model with the Flexifuel grate. After running this stove for several months I gave up trying to burn soft or hard smokeless fuel as the grate is incapable of riddling the ash. The result is that overnight burning is impossible which in my circumstances is essential. The Flexifuel grate can best be described as a wood burning grate with a nervous twitch.
I have contacted Aarrow and expressed my views and have been told that I should fit an older set of firebars which will cost me approximately £50+ which I resent having to pay for. I am dubious as to the effectiveness of this solution. Also, I have found that the stove controls are very difficult to calibrate and very hot to touch. As for the air wash system on the glass, I have little to say that can commend it as the only way to keep the glass clean beyond 5 hours is to run it constantly on a high burn rate, thus using large amounts of fuel. The only feature that I can recommend regarding the Ecoburn Plus 9 is that it does put out a good amount of heat. I purchased this stove in order to replace an older Aarrow multifuel stove which I had run for 25 years and had performed superbly, being run 24/7 for six moths of each year. To compare the two stoves in any respect, is like chalk and cheese. The irony is that I looked at, and carefully examined many other stoves before buying the Ecoburn 9 yet it was the one make which was not held in stock. I bought blind based on the information contained within the Aarrow brochure and website and most importantly that I had run an Aarrow stove for 25 years with perfect results and consequently had full confidence in the brand. What a costly mistake I made.- Show oldest comment first
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Roy Calderwood said 10 years ago:
I have been running this stove coming up on 2 years now. Compared to my 16 year old Charnwood Country 8 stove it is very poor in a lot of areas. This stove was professionally installed after we decided to replace our good drawing open fire with a stove to retain more heat within the room rather than losing so much heat up the chimney,so it has the proper flue liner installed. I find the stove quite hard to light even when using very dry kindling and really well seasoned wood. I find the best way to get it lit is by leaving the door slightly open. During operation there is a constant cracking which is seems to be caused by the top air vent control which seems to constantly expand and contract during heating. Once going the heat output is excellent, but if you decide to fill up the stove mid fire, say you decide to go out and want the fire to stay in whilst away I fine that because the top baffle plate is so close to the front of the stove it causes the smoke to be sucked out of the stove door and thus filling the room with unwelcome smoke. The only time I find to avoid this happening is to refuel when the fire is almost burnt away. Riddling the ash out takes forever using the pathetic excuse for riddling bars. I find the best way to clear the burnt ash is to use a poker to push the ash down through the holes between the riddling bars. Based on my experience with this stove I will not be buying another Aarrow stove.